My desire to make homemade, hand-cut, skin-on, twice-fried chips fades with every passing day of my new life in the roast potato paradise that is the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. As much as I love chunky “fries”, I can’t justify the greasy mess and lasting pong of deep-frying potatoes when I could be roasting them to a perfect crisp, as they do so expertly at two of my favourite kitchens: the Rivington Bar & Grill‘s and my mother-in-law’s.  If only I could British roast my chips…

As luck would have it, my Maris Piper pipe dream is one shared by Peter Weeden, the chef at the Paternoster Steak House.  Weeden doesn’t care for the dirty, clingy, fatty stench from the restaurant’s deep fat fryers and he is troubled by the wastefulness. Once new combi ovens are installed in the kitchen he will begin roasting Paternoster’s chips, confident his bronzed, fluffy-fleshed beauties will lose little of their distinctive flavour and texture. He crisps his chips, as many do their roast potatoes, by roughing them up to expand the surface area exposed to the hot fat. Nothing will change there. (King Edward potatoes have the added bonus of breaking down during cooking, which further increases their surface area.) 

As for their taste, Weeden will take care of that by slathering his roasted chips with beef dripping from the spit roast. Fine with me!

With advice and inspiration from Weeden, here is my recipe for roast chips:

serves 4

1. Preheat the oven to 200 degrees.
2. Scrub the potatoes, halve them, and cut into the size of chunky chips about 2cm wide. Place them in a steamer basket set over boiling water, cover, and steam for 10 minutes. Transfer the potatoes to a pot or colander, cover, and shake vigorously to rough them up. Remove the cover, place a tea towel over the potatoes, and leave to dry in their own steam.
3. Place the beef dripping (or your fat of choice) in a preheated roasting tin and heat in the oven until almost smoking. Toss the potatoes in the tin to coat on all sides and roast, turning them occasionally, until brown and crisp, about 45 minutes. 
4. Drain the potatoes on kitchen towels, sprinkle liberally with sea salt, and serve immediately.